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by Fluffifullness



Series: Tumblr MakoHaru Festival [8]
Category: Free!
Genre: Angst, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, Jealousy, Love Confessions, M/M, Misunderstandings, Prompt Fic, Tumblr: makoharufestival
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-26
Updated: 2014-01-26
Packaged: 2018-01-10 04:08:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,904
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1154703
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fluffifullness/pseuds/Fluffifullness
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Muffled by walls and windows but still there, he hears his own name carried on Makoto’s voice. His own voice is a low rasp, hoarse from disuse and layered thick with negative emotion. He doesn’t say anything loud enough to be heard, but he does respond to the calls at barely above a whisper. Things like go away, please, I can’t.</p>
            </blockquote>





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**Author's Note:**

> Written for the "jealous" challenge of the [makoharu festival on tumblr](http://makoharufestival.tumblr.com/). The tumblr post is [right here](http://makoharufestival.tumblr.com/post/74643978936/challenge-jealous-user-fluffifullness-rating?utm_medium=email&utm_source=html&utm_campaign=submission_published&utm_term=respond_link).

The worst part of the whole thing is probably the way his mind keeps running itself through endless cycles of dull and sharp pain. Every time he tries to find a bright side, the entire reality of it all comes crashing right back down – worse every time, every time harder and harder to keep trying for optimism, for anger – for anything but raw hurt and confusion. He’s vaguely aware of the tang of blood in his mouth – from chewing on his lower lip, maybe, but he doesn’t actually remember doing anything like that – and the stiffness in his limbs. He plays games with himself: if it rains today, he’ll try eating something. If it’s sunny, he’ll at least bring a few glasses of water into his room with him. If he can so much as get out of bed sometime in the next hour, he’ll let himself feel better.

(He doesn’t get up, and he doesn’t feel better. He doesn’t even feel like swimming.)

The other worst parts are knowing that the rest of the world’s still turning normally on its axis, realizing that he should be doing things – bathing, eating, going to school – and not being able to find the motivation. The gnawing awareness of having ignored his friend’s calls, his phone within easy reach every second of every hour, and the fact that his closest friend is at the center of the whole mess.

And it’s not Makoto’s fault – it’s Haru’s. Because he won’t talk about it – because even if he did, he’d still wind up losing. He’s just choosing the easy way out, doesn’t matter that he can’t keep going like this forever. He’ll make it feel like forever, and maybe eventually that’ll be enough to numb the pain.

Four days down and he’s on the fifth. It’s not the first time he’s heard knocking, but this time it’s louder, panicked, pleading.

“Not now…”

Muffled by walls and windows but still there, he hears his own name carried on Makoto’s voice. His own voice is a low rasp, hoarse from disuse and layered thick with negative emotion. He doesn’t say anything loud enough to be heard, but he does respond to the calls at barely above a whisper. Things like go away, please, I can’t.

And Makoto does, eventually. Maybe he thinks Haru’s dead in there, collapsed on the floor and that’s just it.

Of course, if he really did think that, he’d probably be breaking down the door. He’d be here already. He wouldn’t walk away. So he probably knows what it is, the tight knot in Haru’s chest, the shaking that just won’t stop. He knows and he still leaves, anyway, because that’s all he thinks he can handle.

All Haru really knows is that the noise has stopped, but he lets himself believe that it’s because he’s alone.

He rips the battery out of his phone and tosses it at his desk. Putting it back in is too much effort, so that’s where it lies, maybe broken. He drops the gutted electronic on the floor beside his bed and rolls over so that he’s lying on his other side – so that he won’t have to look at it.

No more phone calls to dutifully ignore.

 

She was pretty. One of the prettiest girls in their class, even. Not the first one, not even really out of the ordinary for Makoto – he’s not as popular as any guy like him could be, but he’s been given plenty of attention since their later middle school days. He used to get embarrassed and say that surely they could find someone better than him, but now that he’s a little more comfortable in his own skin, he’s even taken a few girls out on dates.

Just one each, though; he’s never made it past that, and he’s never had much to say on the subject. So maybe Haru got used to not worrying about it. Maybe he wasn’t prepared for anything to change. He’s more or less given up on telling himself that he’s overreacting, but it is at least true that he never bothered to clarify; he’s too afraid of hearing Makoto’s answer. Or even just Makoto’s voice.

He jumps when the doorbell rings; it wakes him up.

“Haru?”

The knot in his chest throbs painfully. It feels almost like something’s twisting there, too, and then there’s a spark of guilt – because Makoto sounds worse than he did yesterday. He sounds a little like Haru. Scared, desperate, exhausted.

“Come open the door. _Please._ Haruka…”

“Don’t call me that,” he whispers back. He wants to be called Haru-chan, he wants Makoto to sound happy away from him. He wants to be alone.

“I’m not leaving,” Makoto calls. “I’ll sleep here if I have to.”

Haru cringes. He doesn’t want _that_ to be his responsibility, either.

Makoto goes quiet then, but Haru knows he hasn’t left. If he went out there now, he’d find Makoto sitting in the dark, propped against a wall with moonlight coloring strands of his hair, highlighting one cheek and curving along the edges of his shut eyes. He’s probably wearing an old T shirt with a jacket and sweatpants. If it were up to Haru, the shirt would be the soft yellow one. The whole scene would look a lot like the one he found before the relay – Makoto sitting by the door, dozed off, ready with a smile when Haru said he’d join them, after all.

He looks over at the clock. He stares at it until his vision blurs and he has to close his eyes. He makes a game of that, too, and then it’s after midnight and he still hasn’t heard Makoto leave.

His arms and legs shake as he drags himself out of bed. His gaze flits briefly to his dresser and he really thinks about at least changing his clothes – but that would be as good as acknowledging that he expects Makoto to see him, so he doesn’t stop. Down the hall, a slow turn, and then there’s the door. He keeps the lights off, moves slowly, puts as little weight as he can onto his feet as he steps closer and finally reaches out to touch the lock. He opens it slowly, wincing at every high-pitched squeak and whine.

And then the whole thing swings inward, and there’s Makoto – curled up on his doorstep, his arms wrapped tight around his knees. His eyes are closed and he’s breathing rhythmic sleep, but Haru has to bite back the urge to run, anyway.

(He realizes belatedly that his lip is bleeding again, stinging.)

Heart racing, he watches. Makoto looks tired, too – he must be, if he can fall asleep anywhere as uncomfortable as this – and he has his backpack with him, lying overturned by his legs.

Haru’s just starting to wonder why Makoto didn’t use that as a pillow when he’s interrupted by a dazed groan. The sound sends a shock through him that pools in his stomach, so suddenly he’s no longer vaguely awestruck or enthralled – just nauseated, reeling from the closeness of the sound. The guilt he feels now is just another kind of fear – of getting caught doing something awful.

He catches his breath and lunges suddenly for the door. His hand closes on the knob and he stumbles noisily inside, but the door won’t close. Haru stifles a cry and wrenches harder at it, but Makoto’s already there in the opening, eyes wide, hands and foot caught stubbornly.

“Haru – please, I just want to talk –”

“No!” Haru croaks. His own voice surprises him. He hasn’t spoken at that volume in days; now it’s grating, harsh, frayed at the edges. It even scares him.

His grip on the door relaxes, and Makoto uses that opportunity to push his way inside. Haru shoves weakly at his chest, but to no avail; Makoto just catches his hands in his own and gives him a pleading look.

“Get out,” Haru chokes. “I – I need to –”

“We need to talk,” Makoto says quietly.

“No, we – we’re fine,” Haru rasps, now wrestling to free his hands from Makoto’s strong grip. He thinks that maybe he should have eaten something today, after all – then maybe he’d be able to fight his way out of this, make Makoto leave and then go back to bed.

“We’re _not_ fine,” Makoto says as he pulls Haru to the floor with him. “You look awful, and you haven’t come to school once all week. Everyone’s worried about you. Me, too,” he adds in a whisper. His hand on Haru’s shoulder, less restraining, now, more self-reassuring. Haru’s here, not sick or dead or anything like that – but more deeply scared and angry and hurt than Makoto’s ever been used to seeing him. “I brought you copies of everything you’ve missed. They’re outside. Can I go pick them up?”

Without being locked out again, he means. Haru doesn’t know how to respond – to say no would be the same as asking Makoto to stay right here at his side, and to say yes would mean that he’s willing to wait patiently for Makoto’s return.

“You can leave,” he whispers uselessly. “Just go home.”

“I can’t.” Makoto sighs and pulls himself to his feet. “I’ll be right back.”

Haru watches him take those few steps to the door, watches him pull it open and move past it – he leaves it wide open, Haru notices – and then he closes his eyes and lies down on the hard wood floor. It’s cold; it feels good. He sighs and pretends not to notice when Makoto sits back down next to him.

“I can make tea for us,” Makoto offers after a moment.

“Don’t want any.”

“Then it’s settled,” Makoto responds, a little angrily. He grabs Haru’s wrist with one hand and uses the other to support Haru’s other side as he pulls him upright. “Come on. Stand up.”

Haru shakes his head, still refusing to open his eyes.

“Haruka,” Makoto warns.

“Don’t.”

“What?”

“Don’t call me that.”

Makoto sighs again and lifts Haru clumsily into his arms. That earns him a startled yelp and a weak blow to the chest, but for the most part all Haru does is squirm as he’s carried into the dining room and lowered to the floor – sprawled across several cushions by the table. He doesn’t even bother moving after that, and he keeps his eyes shut tight.

Makoto leaves him alone and retreats to the kitchen.

 

“Haru.”

He feels the heat rolling off of the tea Makoto’s offering him before he sees anything at all – but he does open his eyes, if only because he’d rather not get burned. Sitting up takes more effort than he’d thought it would, and he almost spills the contents of the cup all over his lap. Makoto eyes him warily until he’s finally situated more or less comfortably.

“Is there anything you want me to do?”

When Haru opens his mouth, Makoto gives him a hard look and says, “Not leaving.”

“Then stay,” Haru mutters. “I don’t care.”

Makoto looks hurt, but he still manages to nod and say, “I said I’d stay all night, didn’t I? You’d have to call the police to get me out of here.”

Haru stares at him. He wants to ask why he’d ever do that, but the question doesn’t feel right on the tip of his tongue. Finally, he bows his head and fixes his gaze on the smooth surface of his tea.

“I – I won’t do that,” he says after another minute.

Makoto lets his held breath go slowly. “Is this my fault?”

Haru hesitates. “…No.”

“What happened?”

“How’s your girlfriend?”

Haru freezes. His eyes widen and his hand goes to his mouth, but he’s already said it. His whole body suddenly feels hot with shame, disbelief – he can’t deal with this, he doesn’t want to hear Makoto say anything about it one way or another. He’s disgusting, that’s all, and now he’s also regretting every last thing he’s thought and done today.

A ripple appears in the center of his cup and slowly spreads outward. Makoto’s hand falls on his shoulder again.

“It’s not like that.”

“What – what’s not,” Haru chokes. It doesn’t even come out sounding like a question.

“I don’t have a girlfriend, Haru. Is that what’s bothering you?”

Haru shivers and finally looks up at Makoto. He thinks he might be crying, but his cheeks don’t feel wet. “So it’s not official,” he says dully.

“It’s not anything. Satoh-san did ask me out, but I turned her down. We still talk because she’s a member of the student council, and they needed some help with a few things. We were just” – he shrugs – “partners, I guess. We’re on good terms, but she’s already found a better guy. That’s why we had to meet at odd times, actually; I didn’t want to keep her from seeing her boyfriend.”

Haru blinks back more tears as the heat spreads and blossoms in his cheeks. The back of his neck tingles.

“But I asked,” he says desperately. “If you had a date. You just said you didn’t know.”

“I said I wouldn’t call it that,” Makoto defends. “I thought there might have been a misunderstanding between Satoh-san and I.”

Haru bristles. “There was a misunderstanding between _us_!”

There’s the barest hint of a smile on Makoto’s lips. “That there was,” he muses, but then he looks a little more concerned, gives Haru a belated once-over and hesitantly presses the palm of his hand to Haru’s forehead. “Are you sick?”

“You know I’m not,” Haru mumbles. The shame’s still there – and it’s getting worse and worse, maybe because now he has to deal with the full force of Makoto’s worry – and for what? He’s an idiot, and he can’t explain to Makoto _why_ it all messed him up as much as it did.

“Was that really it?”

Haru bites his lip – still the hard tang of blood – and nods once.

Makoto clears his throat and mimics the movement without seeming to think about it. “Were – were you jealous?”

Another short nod.

“Of me?”

“Of – of her,” Haru whispers, heart thudding loudly in his chest. His whole body shaking, hot and cold, he feels like he’s falling. “Sorry…”

He steels himself for the moment when Makoto will realize what he means and take his hand off of Haru’s shoulder, tell him that he’s sorry but that’s not going to work, feel betrayed but say nothing so that Haru won’t have anything to dwell on but the look in his eyes. He waits for it all to end.

“Haru…”

“You can leave,” he says quickly. “It’s fine. I know, it’s not – it’s not what you were expecting.”

“I don’t know,” Makoto responds. “Maybe you’re right about that, but – will you look at me for a second?”

Haru does. He can barely see Makoto’s face through a thick screen of unshed tears; he’s having a harder and harder time holding them back. “This whole thing was stupid,” he breathes. “I –”

Makoto shushes him right before he draws him into a hug. Haru’s breath catches, but only briefly before he’s all-out sobbing into the bright yellow and orange fabric of Makoto’s shirt – the one he likes, his favorite – and he likes that his face is hidden like that. He likes that Makoto is warm and he likes that he’s not talking about anything – just sitting, humming some tuneless song and rocking a little. Just like the older brother he is, all comfort and kindness.

Makoto lets Haru be the first to pull away. His face is stinging, his nose running – he turns so that he won’t have to see the stain on the front of Makoto’s clothes – and he still hasn’t quite caught his breath. It’s the first time he’s cried like that since he was a really little kid.

Finally, Makoto sighs and says, “I probably would’ve felt the same way in your situation, Haru. It should have occurred to me that you might’ve misunderstood, but I wasn’t thinking. I’m sorry.”

Haru looks back at him. “How would you feel the same way?”

Makoto lets a slow smile spread across his features. “I just do. I assumed you knew that, too.”

“I don’t mean as a friend, Makoto,” Haru says, strained. “I mean – I was jealous because –”

“I get it.”

“What are you –”

“I get it, Haru. I know what you mean, so you can relax. Take a deep breath.”

Haru ignores that suggestion, instead rushing to find more words for questions. “So – you don’t mind? You’re not disgusted?”

“Of course not,” Makoto says with emphasis. “I’m just – you know, a little mad at myself for letting this go on forever. I should have done this after a day or two, not a whole week later.”

“It’s only been six days,” Haru mumbles. Then he sits a little straighter and feels his face get all hot again. “Ah – Makoto – that’s a long time,” voice small as his hand trails up to tug at his unwashed hair.

Makoto smiles again. “I understand. Do you need any help getting the bath ready?”

“I’m fine,” Haru says. “I just need some clothes to change into.”

“Got it. Go on ahead, then. I’ll leave them by the door and wait here for you to finish.”

“Makoto.”

“Hm?”

Haru hesitates for just a moment before sighing and asking, “If you can find something easy to cook… Would that be alright?”

Makoto laughs. “I think I can come up with something.”

 

Haru’s desperate to stay in the water until it goes from hot to lukewarm to cold, to dwell on every slight sensation of water moving against his skin – to calm down the one way he knows how to do it best. He washes his hair quickly under a thick stream of water, closes his eyes against the rivulets of soap and then opens them too early to avoid the stinging. He takes longer in the bath, but in what feels like seconds, the clicks and clatters coming from the kitchen have died down to nothing, and he’s sure Makoto’s waiting.

Normally, he wouldn’t be interested enough in that to leave the water prematurely, but –

_the look he gave him that smile and his confession in not so many words_

He hasn’t shaken the depression completely, but there’s a new kind of hope pulsing through him now. He wants to talk to Makoto. He wants to know that it’s okay to watch him the way he does, maybe touch him maybe kiss him – do all the things he’s imagined Makoto doing with a beautiful girl at his side.

He wraps a towel around his waist and goes to the door. There are clothes there – right where Makoto said they’d be – and Haru leans in to gather them up in his arms.

He stops when he sees the shirt.

This one is blue and white, maybe not as soft as the other one but definitely a close second. He remembers Makoto leaving it behind accidentally the last time he spent the night, remembers thinking that he’d return it after washing it – remembers failing to do that for days running until even he had convinced himself to forget about it.

Face flushed and legs shaking, he pulls it on despite every misgiving in the book. Makoto may have made a mistake, and how dumb would it look for Haru to have done something like this on top of everything else? He shivers as his hand tightens into a fist around the towel he’s been using to dry his hair; he may as well jump, anyway.

“Makoto,” he greets, hanging back by the door until his friend looks up at him.

A warm smile. “That looks good on you, Haru.”

“I – I only wore it once,” he stammers, looking down. “I was gonna give it back.”

“It’s okay. I have plenty, and it was getting a little small, anyway.”

Haru blushes. He has the feeling that Makoto knows exactly what Haru’s really been up to with it, but that feeling comes seconded by the knowledge that Makoto doesn’t care, won’t judge, can’t find enough reasons to comment on it.

“I tried to make the dish you showed me before,” Makoto says after a short break. “It might not be up to your standards, but I think it’s edible.”

“You think,” Haru repeats blandly.

“Well,” Makoto responds sheepishly. He nods at the plate. “It looks okay.”

“Did you even taste it?” Haru wonders as he takes his seat across from Makoto. He notices that his untouched cup of tea is still sitting where he left it, but the steam suggests that Makoto might’ve heated it up or poured more – kind of amazing attention to detail this early in the morning, Haru thinks.

“Yeah. Like I said, it’s not up to Haru’s usual standards.”

Haru nods before hesitantly taking a bite. Makoto watches him with a mixture of eager anticipation and apprehension.

“…It’s good, Makoto. Did you practice?”

“Only a little,” Makoto says happily. “Ran and Ren liked it, so I’ve been making it every now and then for them.”

Haru sets his chopsticks down and smiles at the food and then up at Makoto. “Thanks.”

“Don’t mention it. You look like you’ve lost a little weight, and that’s kind of –”

“My fault,” Haru interrupts gently. “Sorry – for before. You did more than you had to.”

“It’s fine, Haru. I wanted to,” Makoto murmurs. “Haru – how long have you known you felt that way?”

Haru blinks: a curve ball. “Ah – a while. Middle school, maybe… maybe before that.”

A moment of silence descends on the room. They sit staring at each other like all the pieces have fallen together, a solved riddle on top of a happy ending.

“I thought I was just confused,” Makoto responds after a moment. “When I was a kid… I didn’t understand how any of that stuff worked. I just knew that everyone would think it was strange, so I never said anything. And then there was middle school, and I was” – he laughs – “kind of a mess then. There was no way I could have told you.”

Haru’s face is getting hot, but he leans closer without really meaning to. “I understood it,” he says, voice level. “That’s why I never said anything, either. I thought it was enough for me to just be your friend, but then” – his voice cracks – “this changed my mind. I should’ve thought it through more.”

Makoto smiles. “Looks like both of us would have had a hard time with that, though. If it had been me, I don’t know what I would’ve done. It would’ve been – it would’ve been awful.”

“I have a question.”

“You don’t have to announce it like that, Haru. Just –”

“Will you be my boyfriend?” Haru breathes. “Even if no one else knows. I don’t want this to happen again.”

Makoto turns red in almost record time, head to chest and obviously breathless.

“Oh,” he says. “If you – if that’s what you want, Haru, I’d – I’d really love to.”

Haru takes a deep breath and lets it go slowly. “I might’ve broken my phone,” he says after a moment. “I’ll go get it.”

Startled, Makoto calls after him, “What for? Haru?”

“To apologize to Nagisa and Rei. And Rin, too. I want them to know.”

**Author's Note:**

> I not-deeply apologize for the obviously overblown teen angst with a side of silly misunderstandings. ^^ I felt the need to get that out of my system, and the prompt made it all too easy. (Wait till you see the next one, though.) I'm still a mess of feelings and predictions for season two, so - school allowing - I'll definitely be back with more fluff and angst for MakoHaru, and for Reigisa as well. ~~Seriously, can you believe it? Season two!~~


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